In the midst of kidding season

BBM Nick's Gloria (Nick x Gloria) with two new girls sired by ECR Rusty.

The bulk of our kidding is over with only a few does left to come in. We had the nicest February weather ever and lost no kids to cold or freezing. As an example of how easy the kidding went (let me knock on wood before something goes wrong), here's how last Saturday went. I knew it would be a big kidding day but I slept in til 7 a.m. anyway. Then I had a pot of coffee, read my e-mails, watched the news and weather, and finally got to the pasture about 9. There were eight new babies: three sets of twins and two singles. I wrote them down in my little note pad. I spent the next few hours with my grandson Rylan. We ate lunch at the Longhorn Steak House (did you know they had a lunch menu on the weekend — we both ate steak for $32 total!), then we went and saw the movie Act of Valor. We went to the Malco DeSoto Cinema in Southaven, Miss., with the big recliner seats and super surround sound. This movie about Navy SEALS is great if you love the sounds of machine guns and helicopters. After the movie, Rylan and I went to the nearby Sonic Drive-in and got ice cream and a mocha latte'. We got back to the farm just as the sun was going down. We made a quick tour and found 11 more new babies. Everyone was cleaned up and nursing. I didn't get all of them written down in my notepad because it was getting dark and I couldn't get close enough to a couple does to see if they had boys or girls. We had a total of 19 new babies that day and no problems plus I spent some quality time of the oldest grandson. That's how kidding season should be all the time. 

This brown & white paint bucks gets the award
for oddest colored kid so far. 

When I walked up on this doe and her baby, the kid crouched down

in the grass and leaves to make himself harder to detect. I love when

those feral instincts show up in my goats.

The kids are on the hillside playing while the moms get their daily ration

of 20% cattle cubes (about 1/2 pound). Notice the nice full udders on the does.

These does have made it all winter with no hay.

After a few hours of grazing, the moms come back to the "nursery"

to sort out the kids.

A Kiko x Saanen doe (left) had a single white kid

and a New Zealand Kiko doe had twins in the same clearing 

just a few feet from each other. Both mommas and the 

babies got confused and now the three babies share

the two moms (or are the moms sharing the babies?).